Saturday 5K

So as you know Saturday was yet another 5K while I was fairly proud of my time I was very proud of the race.  This is the second race my 9 yearold asked if he could run in, the first being last December and he was so thrilled that he beat me by a minute.  Well since I have been training and well he has been being a 9 year old boy I knew going into this race that he wouldn't be able to keep up the whole distance.

We started out about midway beack in the runners pack, which is where I felt we would be best positioned for my pace and time, boy was I wrong as less than a quarter mile into the run I am passing people that already have backed off to a walk no big deal as they were nice enough to move off to the far right.

The run went from a hospital parking lot down into an active quary and then back out to the entrace of the quary, and to top it off we had a pretty nasty storm the night before.  Once you hit the quary road it was riddled with puddles and was more like running a trail than a road.  Obviously the first downhill leg was going into the quary which meant you finished going UP HILL!

I was holding a fairly good pace and my son was doing a fairly good job of keeping pace until about mile 1.25, in true fashion he wouldn't ease up to a pace he could maintain but would rather surge forward to get up to me and then fall back.  I could tell by his face that he was pushing to hard, so I hit the point where you say "Do I be a good dad and ease up and work his pace so he doesn't hurt himself or get sick or do I push a head and turn in a decent time and run it in like he did when he beat me"  ok the Good dad side one.  I slowed down to a walk and held his hand as he got his breath and when he was ready to run we ran, and when he needed to walk we walked. I helped coach him therough the last half of the race telling him when we were going to walk based on the color of his face and when we would run based on his ability to talk.  The last .3 miles was a flatout run with him holding my hand the whole time.  We crossed the finish line at the exact same time 35:09.  He placed 9th for his age group, which I was pretty proud of since he does ZERO prep for these.

This turned out to be not so much a race but about doing something with my son.

http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/79537242

i think it's awesome that your son a) can and likes to run races, and b) wants to be involved with your new lifestyle.  i'm seriously impressed.  you have a very supportive family.

Isn't this what the surgery was all about???  I seriously have goosebumps reading your post.  My 9 year old daughter goes with me to the gym almost everyday.  I am encouraged by the fact she is starting a healthy lifestyle as a child.

You're a great dad.  Keep up the awesome work!

Good stuff! Congrats on another one.

AWESOME!!!!!
That's the best post I've rear in a long time!
Good for you and your son!

So Awesome!

I think that when people talk about "quality time" this is exactly what they mean!

Sounds like a great day :)

Beautiful! I wish my teenager would take that much interest in exercising/racing with me. You are very lucky to have such a great kid and he's really lucky to have such a great Dad. And I would have done the same thing. That's what getting healthy is all about.
Congrats!
Jan

i completely agree with the others.... how beautiful that you and your son can do these races together.  A PR is nothing when compared to being out living life with your family and being healthy.

AWESOME!

 Hey Paul, 

Congratulations to both you and your son for a GREAT RACE!  You are living the dream and as someone posted earlier, "this is what having WLS is all about!"

Keep up the great work both as a runner and more importantly as a DAD!

Mike